To commemorate the 160th anniversary of Darlington Building Society, Chris Lloyd takes 16 steps through the society’s history and discovers vote-rigging, despicable defalcations in a pasty shop and a badly-drawn topless girl

1. In late July 1856, a group of men met in the back room of Mrs Johnson’s Eating House in Darlington. They complained that it was impossible for a working man to get a foothold on the property ladder, and decided to form a building society to give that ordinary man a hefty shove onto the first rung.

It is believed that Mrs Johnson’s Eating House was in Church Row, which runs from Tubwell Row to the Market Place, and it was probably in the building that was on the corner before Crombie’s restaurant was built in the 1890s.

2. The first meeting of the Darlington Permanent Benefit Building Society was in Central Hall (now behind the Dolphin Centre) on August15, 1856. Joseph Whitwell Pease, who would become head of the family’s mining, railway and mill interests, was the first president, and William Thompson, a very respected stockbroker who would go spectacularly bankrupt in the 1860s, was the vice-president.

The society’s prospectus said it was aimed at “the industrious and frugal man” – the Victorian equivalent of the “hard-working families” that today’s politicians are forever banging on about.

It was called a “permanent” society to differentiate it from the “terminating” societies which were wound up once all the borrowers had paid back their loans.

“All those of our readers who are interested in the improvement of the town of Darlington will be glad to learn that a building society has just been formed in this place,” said the Darlington and Stockton Times the day after the meeting. “Such a society has long been a desideratum.”

3. The first annual meeting was on October 6, 1856, in the town hall, which was on the site of today’s Covered Market. By now, the society was called the Darlington Working Men’s Equitable Permanent Benefit Building Society, which meant that its letterheads were enormous.

The society had three trustees overseeing its operation: Edward “the father of the railways” Pease, Henry King Spark, a maverick industrialist, and John Harris, a railway engineer. All were Liberals.

Two years after the society’s formation, the first houses were built on the Freeholders’ Home Estate, which was co-owned by Mr Harris, in the Eastbourne area of Darlington. These working class properties were designed to be just big enough so that the owner qualified for a vote in Parliamentary elections.

One of the streets on the estate is named Harris Street. Another is Pease Street, plus there are Cobden and Bright streets, which are named after nationally prominent Liberal politicians.

It would appear, therefore, that Mr Harris’ building society was lending money to men to buy land from Mr Harris on a street named after Mr Harris so that they could vote for Mr Harris’ political party.

4. The society’s first year’s receipts were £2,000 8s 7½d – the halfpenny was part of a fine paid by a borrower who was overdue. The society had lent £1,724 2s 5d in mortgages.

5. In 1876, the society shortened its name to the Darlington Equitable Building Society (DEBS) and adopted an extraordinary logo featuring a topless young lady with a little beer belly – perhaps it was Debs herself. In one hand she held a set of scales, showing how equitable she was with her favours; in the other, she cuddled a cornucopia – a horn of plenty with wealth spilling out of it.

6. The society’s first office was “a dirty little room” in Central Hall, which was open just 30 minutes a day. As the society grew, it moved to more prominent offices in High Row and then, in 1901, started building its own premises.

It acquired a property in Church Row – perhaps even the one in which Mrs Johnson had had her eating house, although it was then occupied by the Commondale Brick and Pipe Company – and set local architect William Agutter, of Horsemarket, to work.

The dignified, £1,100 building opened on April 28, 1903. “It is evidence of the solidity of the society,” said the D&S Times.

But etched large on the glass facing the street was Debs herself, in all her droopy glory.

7. In the 1920s, when the Great Depression ravaged the country, the society’s assets reached £1m. By the outbreak of the Second World War, they were more than £3m.

8. On August 28, 1946, the Darlington Equitable Building Society merged with the Durham and Yorkshire Building Society (D&YBS) to form the Darlington Building Society – so DBS is celebrating both its 160th anniversary and its 70th anniversary.

9. The D&YBS dated back to September 28, 1865, when the Onward Building Society was formed in 85, Northgate – now Greggs’ pasty shop. It was a temperance society, founded by John Harrison and backed by the Pease and Backhouse families.

It was the biggest building society between Newcastle and York until February 5, 1890, when auditors discovered its secretary, Thomas Dennison, bleeding profusely from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head in the toilet on the first floor of the pasty shop. Mr Dennison had attempted suicide because he knew that a black hole in the accounts of £45,151 (about £5.2m in today’s values) was about to be uncovered.

This, as you may imagine, is one of Memories’ most favourite stories.

This, as you will understand, prompted a panic akin to the rush on Northern Rock in 2008 with hundreds of investors besieging the offices in a bid to withdraw their savings.

Ultimately, Mr Dennison was found fairly innocent – he was only sentenced to four months imprisonment for the “despicable defalcation” – and founder Mr Harrison, who had died well respected nine months earlier, was presumed guilty of systematically syphoning off money for 20 years to support his famous, but impecunious, Linthorpe Pottery.

The Onward immediately collapsed.

10. From the ashes of the Onward arose the Phoenix Building Society. It was soon renamed the Durham & Yorkshire, and it quickly became DEBS’ main rival. In fact, the D&YBS was probably the bigger of the two – it announced on February 18, 1910 that its receipts had exceeded £1m, which was more than a decade before DEBS reached that landmark.

11. In 1946, the newly merged DBS had assets of £4.83m and its head office was in Church Row.

12. In 1965, DBS bought the properties between the Golden Cock and Queen’s Head pubs at the top of Tubwell Row, including Harrison’s Yard, for £106,000 and pulled them all down. In their place, it built its new head office, which opened in 1966.

13. By coincidence, the old property next to the Queen’s Head had been the workshop of plumber, glazier and tinplater Edward Todhunter. In 1817, Mr Todhunter had heated coal to create gas and so his ironmongery shop became the first in town to be illuminated by such magic. Huge crowds gathered at night to stare in astonishment at his brilliant windows.

The coincidence is that Mr Todhunter’s daughter married Octavius Barradaile Wooler who was the society’s first solicitor in 1856.

14. The Tubwell Row headquarters were rebuilt in the early 1990s as part of the Cornmill Centre.

15. In 1994, DBS’ headquarters moved to Sentinel House in the Morton Palms area of town, although the Tubwell Row office remains open.

16. DBS entered 2016 as the 21st largest building society in the country, and with a new, smiling logo. It had assets of £532.3m, ten branches, from Guisborough to Barnard Castle, and three agencies. In the year, it has pledged to raise £160,000 for local causes, help 160 local organisations and provide 160 hours of volunteer time by staff in the community – all to commemorate what began in Mrs Johnson’s Eating House 160 years ago.